


i'm here for you

by yourejustsorestless



Category: Figure Skating RPF, Olympics RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe, Angst, F/M, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, commitment issues but not really, two idiots in love
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-03-09
Updated: 2019-04-11
Packaged: 2019-11-14 09:47:34
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 13,718
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18050213
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/yourejustsorestless/pseuds/yourejustsorestless
Summary: It’s been five years since Tessa Virtue and Scott Moir quit ice dancing. She’s a ballerina who, when not on the dance floor, likes to stay in the background. He’s the captain of the hockey team, brimming with confidence and always at the front of the crowd. Now Tessa’s moved back to Ilderton from attending the Canadian Academy of Ballet. She plans on finishing 11th and 12th grade at the Ontario Gifted School, and is suddenly thrusted back into the life of the brown hair, brown eyed boy that held her hand in his for four years.





	1. first time seeing you

**Author's Note:**

> thought I'd try something new... here's an AU for if they were to have stopped skating after the first four years of their partnership (when tessa was 11 and Scott was 13)

**September, 2006**

There were three other ballerina’s at the Ontario Gifted School. A petite blonde with impeccable technique, a taller and more muscular brunette who could leap over the moon, and a pale-skinned Asian girl who Tessa was sure was the most flexible person in the world. It was just after their three and a half hours of regular core classes where the four of them would meet in the dance room, pointe shoes at the ready, and practice. The girls were focused and confident in all of their movements, Tessa noticed as she walked into the studio on the second day of school. 

They seemed to all know each other quite well, leaving together for lunch and always sitting together during their study hall block. Tessa wasn’t surprised, she’d prepared herself for this exact scenario when she enrolled in OGS. It was a relatively small town, and though she’s been on the other side of the country for the past five years she’s still very familiar with the atmosphere here in the east. 

Tessa threw on sweatpants and a black Adidas jacket and left the studio before the other girls, heading to her study hall block. 

“Hey!” Kaitlyn called her over. She was a small girl with blonde hair plaited into two French braids and a wide smile.

Tessa threw her things down next to her and sat next to her, putting her head in her hands in fatigue.

“Tired?” Kaitlyn asked, pulling out her notebook.

“Exhausted.”

She was lucky that she had Kaitlyn around. The two had instantly became close friends but were only together for a few weeks before Tessa left for the Canadian Academy of Ballet, though had luckily stayed in close contact.

“Come on,” she nudged her in the arm with a smirk on her face. “I need to catch you up on the hot goss’ here at OGS.”

The room had square tables scattered around and a mix of students either furiously working away or mindlessly chatting. Kaitlyn gestured to one a few metres away, a clutter of kids half conversing half wrestling.

“That blonde is Charlie White. Doubles figure skater. Apparently he has a huge crush on his partner Meryl,” She pointed at the small brunette a few chairs away from him.

“Pairs figure skating or ice dancing?” Tessa asked.

“There’s a difference?” Kaitlyn mocked, earning a playful slap in the arm from Tessa. “Ice dancing.”

“Oof, that’s intimate.”

“Yup, and Meryl has no idea that Charlie, like, loves her.” To prove her point, Charlie’s eyes trailed the petite girl as she walked around the room, oblivious of her admirer. “And that tall guy, the senior Fedor Andreev is a total douche. He’s making his way through all of the girls in the entire senior school, apparently.”

Fedor was tall and had scraggly black hair. He wore a leather jacket and a grin so smug it made Tessa want to look away. 

“Well Fedor was always like that,” Tessa said. “Not surprising.”

“Oh right, I keep forgetting that you used to live here and no all about the skating boys.”  
  
“Well we didn’t really know each other until just before I left for Vancouver.”

Kaitlyn nodded, continuing to scan the room as Tessa fumbled in her backpack to pull on a gray sweatshirt.

“And right on cue are the hockey boys.” Tessa could hear Kaitlyn’s eyes rolling as she spoke. “Arrogant jerks, most of them are.”

“Kaitlyn, you’re dating a hockey player. The assistant captain of the Ontario team,” Her voice was muffled as she pulled on her unwashed and slightly stained sweatshirt.

“Okay, but Andrew is really sweet. And you can’t deny that they are really, really hot,” Kaitlyn said as Tessa struggled to pull on the sweatshirt. “ _Especially_ this year’s captain, Scott Moir.”

“WHAT?!” Tessa exclaimed under a layer of fabric. 

_Scott Moir._ She hadn’t heard that name in five years. A warm feeling bubbled in her stomach as her heart simultaneously skipped a beat. It was the name of the brown hair brown eyed boy who had saw her across the rink that day she started skating lessons an eternity ago. Her mind was riddled with the fear of joining a new class with no friends, but she also knew that she wanted to be able to skate when they went on their class trip a few days later. He’d been so confident, eyes shining as he flashed his award-winning Moir boy smile at her and invited her to skate with him and his friends. As a joke his older brother, then a sly preteen, had them hold hands and skate around the rink together like the older ice dancers. Tessa had obliged, following the lead of the fearless boy who held his hand out to her, but it was jokes on them, because for the next four years she’d never let go.

Finally fumbling free from her self-inflicted sweatshirt prison, leading all her limbs to the right holes, she looked to where Kaitlyn’s eyes fell at the group of people that just walked into study hall. And indeed there he was, the same boy with the same brown hair and brown eyes, flashing a smile that just radiated confidence.

Scott

 

* * *

 

**November, 1997**

“I know it looks scary but look over there,” Kate Virtue pointed towards a group of kids Tessa’s age across the rink. “They’re about your age. You can make friends with them.”

Tessa shifted uncomfortably, adjusting to the new weight that her pair of white rental skates brought as she walked slowly to the rink.

“Mom they already know how to skate,” she said to her mother, already deducing that they knew how to skate judging from their lack of helmets.

“But I bet you’re just about as smart as they are,” Kate chirped with a smile, patting her daughter reassuringly on her white helmet as she gingerly stepped onto the ice as a girl in her teens skated over to them.

“Hi!” She glided to a graceful halt in front of them. “You must be Tessa, I’m Sophie. I’ll be leading the beginners skating course today.”

The nice girl gave Tessa a few quick tips on how to skate then left her momentarily to greet someone else. She was a few metres away from her mom now, off to the side of the skating rink and far from the cluster of other kids. She could feel her balance wobbling from side to side on the thin blades, and held her hands out to steady her as she tried to glide forwards like Sophie did. Determined to learn to skate, she angled her body and tried to lift her legs and push forwards, before loosing her balance and falling back onto her bum.

Eyes beginning to sting with tears (a mixture of pain and embarrassment, but mostly the latter), she put her bare hands on the ice to push herself back up, not noticing the boy who had skated effortlessly up to him.

“Hey,” he said, getting Tessa’s attention. She looked up at the voice as she stood back up on her skates. He had long brown hair that fell over his brown eyes, and had rosy cheeks from a cold morning of skating paired with a wide smile. “I’m Scott Moir. D’you want some help?”

He stood a few metres away from her, unsure whether or not to come closer. Usually she was exceptionally nervous around strangers, especially those she’d just been embarrassed in front of, but at the moment was just grateful to not be embarrassed _and_ alone on the ice. 

“Yes please,” she replied. “I’m Tessa.”

“No way! I have a friend named Tessa,” Scott said, skating closer. 

“Really?”

He nodded. “She’s not as nice as you are though. I think maybe I’ll call you something else if that’s okay. Like Tess, or T?”

Tessa smiled at his ideas for nicknames. Usually she would be called ‘Tessie’ or occasionally “T-Bird” by her older siblings, but she hated those names.

“I like that,” she said as he flashed an even larger smile at her.

“Cool,” he skated next to her. “When you skate you should push forwards with your feet instead of trying to lift them. And then just keep your balance centred.” He went forwards a bit to show her.

Tessa followed him, moving forwards and almost loosing her balance again.

“Here, take my hands,” he turned to face her and reached his hands out for her to take. Tessa took them without thinking, letting out a breath she didn’t know she was holding as he helped to steady her.

“Cold hands, Tess!” He grinned.

“Sorry,” she said, admiring the way he easily skated backwards and forgetting how she had her hands on the bare ice a few moments ago. “I’ve always had cold hands.”

“No worries,” he said with a smile so warm and genuine she thought he might be the sweetest boy she’s ever met. 

They skated like that a little while longer, before she finally found a rhythm and smoothly skated forwards without Scott’s help. Her heart still beat at a wild pace as she moved the pressure from one skate to another, but was almost keeping up with Scott’s pace.

“You’re a really fast learner,” he said, and she could feel a blush rising in her cheeks. 

Finally Sophie called them all in, and Scott’s group of helmet-less friends raced to the centre of the rink. But Scott stayed with Tessa as she slowly wobbled and skated towards them, making a joke about her cold hands that they laughed loudly at. Suddenly, it didn’t feel like her heart was racing so fast anymore, and she forgot about her mother waiting at the stands. All she wanted to do was skate around the ring again, learning to go faster and faster, gliding with the nice boy and giggling at his jokes.

 

 

* * *

 

**September, 2006**

“Hello? Earth to Tessa?” Kaitlyn waved a hand in front of her face and snapped her back to reality.

“What? Sorry,” she said, still keeping her eyes trained on him. It was like he’d completely changed but at the same time stayed completely the same. He had the same long and unkempt brown hair, but also broad shoulders and strong arms. And when did he get so tall?

“You okay? What are you looking at?” Kaitlyn asked, confused. 

Scott and his friends sat down around a table, and as he spoke with his friends (recognizing one as Patrick Chan and one as Eric Radford) she recognized the carefree way he laughed, a hand tousling through his hair. 

_Tessa, stop staring at him like an idiot._ She tore her gaze away from their table and focused back on her work, mouth suddenly feeling dry and breath increasing.

“Or… is it a who?” Her friend said in a sly and teasing voice.

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Tessa snapped, perhaps a bit too harshly. Kaitlyn seemed to notice this and pick up on her sudden change in attitude. She pretended to scribble a note down in her notebook when she was really writing the first things that popped in to her mind ( _chocolate, Funny Face, popcorn chicken, Canadian geese)_. 

“Tessa Virtue, are you staring at the very good looking captain of the Ontario Knights?” 

Tessa bit her lip as the blood rushed to her ears, and she tried to ignore his (very loud) laughter coming from the other side of the room. It had a strikingly familiar ring to it.

“You should know, he’s totally off limits,” Kaitlyn said, causing her to look back up at, brows furrowed in confusion. It’s not that she liked him, per se, it was just that Scott is one of the—if not the—nicest and genuinely sweet boys she’d ever known. Of course, this was five years ago. She knew Kaitlyn was studying her closely, trying to understand her sudden interest in him. “Well I mean, he’s kind of a douche. Or that’s what I hear, at least from at least half of the hundreds of girls he’s dated. It’s like he can’t stay in a relationship or something… we think he has some serious commitment issues.”

_Commitment issues?_ Tessa almost snorted at this. There was no one who could be more committed than Scott Moir. It was even evident when he was nine years old and all the same when he was thirteen, while they were still skating together.

“Why are you so interested in him?” Kaitlyn asked, and Tessa found that her eyes had drifted back to their table and the way he casually fiddled with a pencil and bounced his knee up and down. Always so restless.

“Nothing,” she said unconvincingly, returning Kaitlyn’s gaze. “Well you know how I used to skate a lot before I left Ilderton?”

“Umm, vaguely, but it wasn’t anything serious right?” Tessa sucked in her cheeks, overestimating how much Kaitlyn knew about her past in Ilderton. It was partly why she loved being around her though—Kaitlyn was a fashionista through and through, not giving a damn about athletics (except for the Ontario Knights, apparently).

“Well we were kind of Canadian junior championships…”

“What?!” Kaitlyn said a bit too loudly. “You were a Canadian junior champion at figure skating?!”

“Well I—“

“Wait, wait, wait,” Kaitlyn interrupted. “You just said ‘we.’ What do you mean ‘we?’”

“Yeah that’s the thing,” Tessa said. “Scott and I were kind of ice dance partners for four years.”

“Wait hold on. You mean to tell me, that you spent four years of your life being all cuddly and intimate on ice with _Scott fucking Moir_?"


	2. and i wont let you fall

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i should be sleeping but instead i stayed up an extra hour and a half to write this so i could post it and wake up to (hopefully) happily to some comments haha...
> 
> please enjoy your favourite two love struck idiots.

**September, 2006**

Tessa loved the Carmen Suite solo. It was beautiful, filled with long lines and an intricate rhythm with hard footwork and control. Her mind was filled with all she needed to remember—shoulders down, core tight, pointed foot, supporting arch—as she danced in front of the three other girls and Madame Clemente, their dance teacher. The song finally ended as she moved from her final sequence of fouettés into her ending position, face slightly red and a sheen of sweat across her body.

There was a burning cramp in her calves that threatened to take her consciousness in the small and stuffy room. Though she could tell the girls were impressed by the way that they crossed their legs and whispered in each other’s ears. Madame Clemente, however, looked less than please as she tried to mask the pain and walk effortlessly to take a sip of water.

“What was that?” Their ballet teacher had a sharp voice that complimented her angular features. Tessa bit her lip, shrinking into the corner of the room. Madame Clemente seemed to sense her nerves, and gentled slightly.

“Tessa, you have lovely long legs and good technique,” she said, her Quebecois accent laying thick. “Your rhythm is good and you have all the power, but you lack emotion.”

The other girls took their turns practicing the Carmen solo, and Tessa sat off to the side stretching out and massaging her calves. When the class finally ended she threw on a pair of sweatpants over her black leotard heading straight out the door before Madame Clemente stopped her.

“You are an amazing dancer, Tessa,” she said quietly. “You can get the solo as Carmen. But you need to have more confidence and play her role. Ballet is more than how high you can get your leg or how many turns you can do. You need to have more emotion, more passion.”

Tessa nodded, sucking in her cheeks as she left the studio, unsure of what to do next. Their auditions for the lead in the Carmen Suite ballet production was less than a month away, and apparently during this time she needed to learn how to feel an emotion.

She walked into study hall, trying her best to ignore the stinging in her legs as she made her way over next to Kaitlyn, who hasn’t seemed to acknowledge her presence yet due to a pair of noise-cancelling headphones and her designing sketchbook. Settling next to her, she pulled out her own things before being called by a loud voice. 

“Tessa Virtue? Come register classes and confirm your schedule for this term, please.”  


There was a small group of students gathered near the main desk at the front of the room, and Tessa groaned to herself as she pushed herself up fom the table and used her arms to slowly add pressure on her legs. They stung as she walked, a buzzing sound omitting in her ears. _Had I remembered to take painkillers today?_

It was so strong that she forgot she was walking around without a jacket on, her back being covered only by a few criss crossing black strings and her front side being hugged tightly by her black leotard that left her arms and a bit of cleavage exposed.

“I’ll just need to confirm some things real quickly,” the same loud voice said, rustling through some papers. Tessa forced herself to focus, taking a deep breath in and exhaling slowly with a nod.

“Okay, full name please?”

“Tessa Virtue.”

“I think you’re listed with your middle names as well, I can’t seem to find a record. What’s your middle name?”

Her stomach twisted inside her, and she had to firmly push down a dry heave that was rising up her throat. _Did I forget to eat breakfast today?_

“Tessa? You’re middle name?” The lady sounded annoyed. She blinked back some tears that drew her attention to the agonizing pain now circulating her legs as she opened her mouth to speak, but was interrupted before she could say anything.

“It’s Jane,” the voice said. “Tessa Jane McCormick Virtue.”

She spun around quickly, seeing standing a few metres away a boy with brown hair sloppily draped over his eyes (though she knew that they were a golden brown), head tilted slightly in confusion and a hockey bag slung over one shoulder.

They stared at each other for a quick second, the rest of the world washing away as she took him in close up for the first time in five years. He had high cheekbones and a strong jaw that was slightly clenched. But it seems that she turned too quickly, and just as Scott’s lips broke into a grin the waves crashed into her head and she felt her legs giving up on her. The corners of her vision darkened, feeling her body make no effort to brace herself for the fall as sound echoed away slowly. 

The last thing she felt surprisingly wasn’t the impact of the dirty, carpeted floor of the Ontario Gifted School’s study hall, but a pair of strong arms.

 

* * *

 

**December, 1997**

Tessa ran to the doors of the Ilderton Skate Club, leaving her mother behind in the car. She quickly kicked off her shoes and placed them neatly in the cubby and gingerly took out the pair of brand new skates from it’s box. Admiring the crisp white leather she wiggled her toes and laced them up, heading over to the ice as soon as possible. She now felt more than confident on the ice, thanks to Sophie’s bi-weekly skate classes. It occurred to her that she had really loved skating, the feeling of gracefully gliding on the ice, almost as much as she loved dancing. She loved skating particularly on Saturdays, which was the date today, when she would get to the rink fifteen minutes early and skate around with Scott, and leave fifteen minutes later.

As always he was joking around with his friends, but quickly skated over to her as he noticed her presence. She slid to a clean stop in front of him, tucking a piece of brown hair behind her ears (mostly to further emphasize to him that no, she did not need a helmet anymore).

“Hey T!” He smiled at her. “Nice skates. Are they new?”

“Yeah!” She grinned back at him. “My brother Casey got them for me as an early Christmas present. And my mom says that I can start taking figure skating lessons here as well!”

They fell into their routine of skating around the perimeter of the ice. At first it was with him in front of her, holding her hands and going backwards, but now Tessa skated confidently and comfortably next to him.

“That’s awesome! My brother does pairs figure skating with Sophie. It’s really cool, they spin around and do really cool lifts.”

Right on schedule Sophie and an older boy with the same brown curls (but was much taller) came next to them.

“Scottie!” The older boy ruffled his hair playfully.

Scott groaned at who Tessa now knew was his older brother. “Don’t call me that, Danny.”

Danny chuckled as Sophie shot a glare at him. “I’m just teasing.”

“You and Tessa look pretty cute, just like us when we skate before our practices,” Sophie said as she intertwined her hand with Danny’s and the four of them skated together in a row. Internally, Tessa was beyond excited to beable to keep up with Scott and the two best skaters in the rink.

“Soph are you comparing us to my idiot little brother?” That sly remark earned him a slap in the arm, but Tessa saw that they were both smiling. 

“You guys should hold hands too,” Danny continued. “You know, just like us _big kids._ ” He was mocking Scott, and Tessa’s heart sank, thinking maybe he was embarrassed to always be skating with her.

But as she lifted her eyes up to him, she saw that he had his hand outstretched in front of him, and a sly glint in his eyes reflecting back at her. She took his hand and they skated, forwards in perfect harmony, finding their rhythm and balancing off of each other to sync their movements. It was the first time they’d held hands this way, working together to glide around instead of her just trying to steady herself. As always his hand was warm and warmed hers up instantly.

She heard a small _aww_ sound from Sophie and felt a blush coming on to her cheeks.

“A few more years you guys will be taking skating circles around us,” Sophie said to them with a wink.

“Ha, seriously?” Danny said. “I wouldn’t trust Scottie in lifts. He’d drop Tessa for sure.”

Scott huffed out a breath and turned towards his brother, finally having enough.

“I would never let Tess fall.”

He squeezed her hand and she took the cue to follow him as they moved away from the older pair, falling back into their previous rhythm. For some reason she could feel the blush on her cheeks intensify, and had to bite down on the inside of her mouth to keep an overwhelmingly large smile from spreading over her face. 

 

* * *

 

**September, 2006**

Tessa rubbed her eyes open as her head spun around and around, struggling to find it’s way back to her body. The ringing was thankfully subsiding, and fluorescent light flooded her vision as she adjusted to the light.

“Oh good, you’re awake,” a soft voice to her right said. Jumping at the sudden sound, she turned to see Scott sitting in a wooden chair next to her flower-sheet bedspread. 

“Shit, sorry.”

She cringed and swallowed, trying to think of why she was now sitting in the nurse’s room on a bed with a horrendous flower bedspread. 

“You, uh, kinda passed out.” Scott somehow knew what she was thinking, and offered her a glass of water. He was wearing a navy hoodie with ‘Ilderton Knights’ plastered on the front accompanied with a ‘C’ for captain, and she could see his name and number on the back.

“Dammit,” she sipped the water as the memory of forgetting her middle name came back to her. 

“How are you feeling?”

“Uhm,” Tessa hesitated, wondering what to say. _Oh you know, just completely mortified to have passed out in front of you, Scott. Especially since we haven’t spoken or seen each other in five years. Great first impressions are really my specialty, you see._ “Good. Fine, really,” she added, noticing the way he raised his eyebrow at her. 

They kept their eyes on each other. _I’m fine,_ she thought. _No you’re not,_ Scott responded back wordlessly. They were interrupted by the nurse coming in.

“How you doing, Tessa?” She chirped as Tessa muttered another _I’m fine_. “You better head home and get some rest. You’ve really been overworking in ballet. Can your mom come and pick you up?”

“Actually she’s in Toronto right now, but I can stay the rest of the day. It’s just study hall,” she said, shifting her position and sitting up on the bed.

“I can take her,” Scott said quickly as the nurse looked at the two of them. “I have a car I’ll just drive her home and come right back for the last hour of study hall.”

“Okay,” the old lady responded. “I’ll write you both a note, but you better come straight back after.”

She left the two of them alone, and Tessa opened her mouth to speak.

“Before you say no, Tess, just let me take you home okay?” Scott interrupted. “You need to get some rest.”

She bit her lip and weighed some calculations in her head. Stay the rest of the day in discomfort and fatigue (the ringing in her head has also come back) or go home to her bed, eat some chocolate and fall asleep but sit alone in a car with Scott Moir for ten minutes. Her mind told her to pick the former, but instead she nodded slowly, avoiding eye contact and rubbing her still bare arms.

“I’ll go grab your things,” Scott said, standing up and taking his hoodie off in one swift motion. “And here, we don’t want you to catch a cold.” 

She accepted the sweatshirt, grateful to have something to cover up with as she suddenly noticed how little she was wearing for mid-Canadian-winter. 

“Scott?” He turned to face her. “Thank’s for… you know, not letting me collapse on the floor.”

He smirked and she saw a familiar glint in his eyes. 

“Anytime, T. You know I’d never let you fall.”

 


	3. forever and for always

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sorry i haven't been updating frequently lately! life and all -_- but a recent comment inspired me to start up again! will be updating twice a week now :))

**September, 2006**

Tessa thumped dramatically on her bed. She was trying to control the racing in her heart that she was certain her neighbours could hear as she thought about what had just happened.

**A few moments earlier…**

They walked down the hall together, sporting notes from the nurse. It was fairly empty, with just a few people scattered around. A cold blast hit them as they left the building, prompting Tessa to hug Scott’s oversized sweatshirt closer to her and shivering slightly. It smelled alarmingly warm and comforting. They hopped into a familiar black Ford truck that used to belong to Danny, and she had to remember to sit in the front instead of the leather seats in the back. 

“So,” Scott started as he turned the ignition and slowly pulled out of the school driveway. “How was Vancouver?” His voice was steady as always, but she knew there was a slight heft in the air in the truck.

“It was good. A lot of ballet everyday, it’s pretty tiring.”

“You know I’ve never actually seen you do ballet, except from when you were nine.”

“That barely counts. It was Christmas at my family’s house and a joke with Jordan and I.” Tessa laughed softly at the memory. “Anyways I hear you’re a hotshot hockey guy now. Still dreaming of playing for the Leafs?”  
  
“Far from hotshot.” He cringed. “To be honest I just did it so I could stay on the ice after you left.”

Tessa bit her bottom lip, cringing slightly at his remark. She knew he wasn’t trying to seem mad or resent her but she couldn’t shake the fact that he most definitely, probably did. _This is where you apologize to him, Tessa,_ a voice in her head said. She swallowed and breathed in, trying to suck up enough courage to get the words out.

“Scott I’m really sorry,” she said, fiddling with a piece of hair. “For not calling you. I meant to, I really did, it just—“

“Time went by,” he said, keeping his eyes forward on the road. She could see that his jaw was tight, something he usually did when he was angry. 

Tessa’s heart sank at the sight. Scott was never able to control his emotions (or his words) very well..

“I really missed you,” She said softly, looking out the window. And it was true. She couldn’t count how many times she sat in her dorm room, curled up in a jumble of blankets and pillows, longing for his presence. More than once she’d dialled the first few digits of his phone number but had back-pedalled before being able to continue with the call. Ballet was her life, sure, but there were days where all she wanted to do was take off the pointe shoes and strap on a pair of skates, gliding carelessly and freely on the ice with her hand in a very sweet brown-haired boy’s. But most of all, she missed her best friend.

The car stopped in front of her two story brick house, and Scott turned off the ignition. It had just dawned on her that she never needed to give him an address. She moved to undo her seatbelt and noticed that he was doing the same, making his way over to her before she could step out of the car. The crisp cold air bit at their cheeks as she gingerly stepped forwards, a slow burn pulsating through her calves with each step. Scott moved his arm around her to gently support her waist as they moved forwards. She wasn’t sure whether to be embarrassed for needing his help or thankful for how he wordlessly knew exactly what to do. They stopped as she opened the front door and stepped inside.

“Thank you, Scott.” A slight tingling sensation lingered where his arm had been, and she felt infinitely more empty without it there, supporting her.

He gave her the classic Moir grin as she reluctantly closed the door. Really she just wanted to jump into his arms for the huge hug that she needed after five years, his arms wrapped around her and letting her snuggle into his shoulder. 

“Wait,” she stopped as he opened the truck door. “Your sweatshirt.”

She reached to pull it off.  
  
“Keep it,” he called back. “It looks better on you anyways.” He smiled at her and stepped into the car, and she swear she could see a hint of something in his eyes—something deep and sad. He drove off before she had a chance to respond, and another icy blast chilled her body before she could get the door shut.

 

* * *

 

**January, 1998**

Tessa wasn’t sure when it had happened, exactly, all she knew was that now instead of attending the 9:00AM to 10:00AM skate practice with Sophie she was now taking the 10:00AM to 11:00AM advanced pairs skating class. It had started with her lingering on the ice with Scott after class, learning new tricks and aimlessly chatting. Since Danny’s challenge and jokes of holding hands a few weeks ago, they’ve made a habit of skating around the rink with their hands together—firstly as an extra “screw you” (as Scott put it) to his older brother and now mostly because they were used to it. 

Scott’s aunt Carol Moir coached the advanced pairs skaters, which included Danny and Sophie and another pair. She had originally been very wary of the fact that the older kids were practicing, but Scott had been adamant in being able to skate around with her. He’d even went as far as to try and distract his brother and joke around with Carol while Tessa stood to the side, mortified. This was before she found out his parents ran the Ilderton skate club.

With his guidance over the past few weeks, Tessa had improved immensely and was now completely able to keep up with Scott. They laughed and joked around, hand in hand, copying the teen skaters in their skate patterns the best they could. Eventually Carol pulled them to the side, and Tessa’s stomach had churned completely inside of her in fear.

“I’m sorry, are we bothering you?” Tessa asked gingerly, voice quivering. To her surprise, though, Carol had only smiled softly, eyes darting between them.

“Would you guys like to try some of the advanced steps?” She asked with a wink.

She knew that Scott was excited by the way he squeezed her hand tighter, and it was confirmed by the way he lit up like a Christmas tree when she looked over. That look alone was enough to soften her nerves and break out a smile on her face as they graciously accepted Carol’s offer. 

So that’s how now, as the older kids skated around and practiced their footwork, Tessa and Scott did the same, just slightly modified by Carol. As a combined effort during one of their breaks, the other kids and Carol had even taught them their first ever lift; Tessa’s arms wrapped around Scott’s neck and him supporting her back and under her knees in a bride-and-groom style position.

Tessa giggled the first time they tried the lift, and he was able to sustain her weight for about six seconds before setting her down with a sharp exhale.

“Sorry, I’m a bit heavy.”

“No you’re not,” he said without missing a beat. “I’m just not that strong is all. You’re awesome.”

That had made her smile.

Today they were working on a step sequence that was a bit harder. Tessa groaned in frustration as the blade of her skate accidentally hit Scott’s, knocking them out of balance. Behind him the two advanced pairs were performing it perfectly. She furrowed her brow, biting her lower lip. It wasn’t that she wasn’t happy to be skating, but she was already in a bad mood after witnessing a more intense quarrel between her parents.

“Tess it’s okay, we’ll get it,” she lifted her eyes to meet his, shining as always, projecting only happiness and confidence. He took hold of her hand again and they skated forwards a bit, the cold air from the fast glide forwards already calming her down.

“I’m sorry I don’t know why that part just isn’t working for me,” she said quietly to him.

“It’s _fine_ ,” he responded, emphasizing the syllable.

“You’re not mad at me?” She asked as they continued to skate around the rink.

“I could never be mad at you, T!”

“You promise?”

“Forever and for always,” he said, swishing her pony tail with his free hand.

Tessa giggled. “That’s so corny. Sounds like something from a movie.”

“That’s what they said in the movie we watched last night. Moulin Rouge or something,” Scott said a little quieter.

“It’s pronounced _rouge,_ not _rooge_ ,” she said slyly, before realizing that a blush had begun to spread on Scott’s cheeks.

“And it’s a really great movie,” she added quickly.

“Yeah? You like it?”

“Oh yes! Forever and for always.”

Scott laughed and she knew that he wasn’t upset anymore, and the next time they ran the sequence they were in perfect sync and their momentum was perfect. Little did he know that she had actually never seen the movie, but when she went home that night she begged her mum to watch it. Eventually she gave in, and although confused, she rented the movie and played it for their family to watch. 

No one knew why Tessa had burst into a fit of giggles when Christian said that he would “love Santine, forever and for always.”

 

* * *

 

**September, 2006**

“Hey, how’re you feeling?” She felt Kaitlyn pop in text to her, combat boots thumping along the halls and leather jacket draped over her shoulder.

“Tired,” Tessa replied, trying to ignore the slight ring in her head that she woke up with. She’ll also tried to avoid the fact that she had slept for about thirteen hours, waking up to a strong (but familiar) scent, musky and soft. She wasn’t too clear on how she ended up sleeping in his navy sweatshirt, but didn’t complain at how it kept the cold morning from nipping at her shoulders. Said sweatshirt was also crammed into her ballet bag, between a set of pointe shoes and an untouched leotard, suddenly glad the nurse had prescribed her a strict two days off dance. 

“Okay, okay, cut the crap,” Kaitlyn stopped them in the middle of the hallway to study hall. “Tell me what happened between you and hockey boy?”

Tessa scoffed and continue to walk. “Nothing. He just drove me home yesterday.”

“Tessa I saw you in his hockey sweatshirt walking maybe just _a smidge_ too closely together to his truck,” they stopped at their usual spot in study hall.

“Kait, he was just being nice. Anyone else would do the same.”

Right then the man in question sauntered over to their table, hair messily swept to the side. He smiled quickly at Kaitlyn before turning to Tessa.

“How you feeling?” He asked casually. Tessa had to remind herself to take a breath and respond, colour rising in her cheeks.

“Great, thanks,” she said, drifting her eyes away from his. “And thank you so much again for driving me back—“ she paused, biting her lower lip “—and your sweatshirt.”

She fumbled with the zipper of her ballet bag and pulled out the neatly folded hoodie, his number (17) and the word MOIR printed in bold white letters showing off on the back. Kaitlyn was scribbling in her notebook, but Tessa knew the girl had all her senses magnified, eavesdropping and tuning in to their conversation as much as she could.

“No don’t worry about it, it’s fine,” Scott waved away at her outstretched hand.

“It’s your team hoodie,” Tessa responded, raising an eyebrow. “You _need_ to take it back.”

He grinned at her again, finally giving in and reaching for the sweatshirt and using his other hand to brush his hair away from his face. Through the interaction she felt his knuckles brush past her palm.

“Thanks Tess,” he smiled. She worked up the courage to maintain eye contact with him, staring into golden brown eyes. They were exactly the same as the pair of eyes she looked into twice a week all those years ago, and held the same expression reflecting back to her. The silence was thick among the conversing of distracted students around them. 

As usual, he was the one to finally break the silence. “Well I’ll, uh, see you around T.”

He gave them another signature smile before heading back off to his group of friends, and she knew his presence was acknowledged once their loud chattering became even louder. It was hard to keep a smile from breaking out on her own face, hearing him call her all of her old nicknames. She slowed her breaths, trying to keep control of her elevated arrhythmias.

Beside her, she heard something that resembled a giggle and a cackle. “You _so_ like him.” Tessa rolled her eyes and turned back towards her work. “And what was with the names? Tess? T?”

“It’s nothing, Kait.”

“But you don’t have nicknames.” Tessa shrugged apathetically at this. “Either way, it was really cute. But Scott Moir is still a no-no as boyfriend material, so don't get any ideas.”

Thankfully they left the conversation at this, and Kaitlyn was immediately immersed in her sketches again. Even though she tried to focus on her math work all that was coming up in her mind was Scott saying her name. _Thanks Tess. See you around, T._ Surprisingly, it stirred up a warm and pleasant feeling and she let a small smile escape from her face as she scribbled a trigonometric function messily across the page.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so much love for these idiots <3


	4. des plus

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Another day in the world of angsty Tessa and Scott who love each other but they dont know it... (p.s. des plus in french is translated to 'more')

**October, 2006**

“Des plus! Tessa! Je veux de l’émotion!” Madame Clemente’s voice rang throughout the studio as Tessa finished her last sequence of fouettes. 

Every inch of her body was sore. A layer of perspiration layered over her skin and wrenching muscles. As she finished her ending pose the familiar wave of fatigue and aching washed onto her head. Her feet throbbed in her pointe shoes, not to mention the avalanche that has cascaded down onto her calves.

Madame Clemente gave her a look, and Tessa knew what she was saying in the midst of silence. _No emotion. Good feet. More expression. Tighten up the turns._

“Remember who you are playing, girls,” she turned to the rest of the class, all of them now leaning against the mirrored walls. “Carmen is confident, alluring, a seductress.” Madame Clemente emphasized each word, letting her Quebecois accent flow through the vowels as if giving the tired dancers energy.

Even though she spoke to all of them, Tessa knew it was mainly directed at her. Auditions were a few short weeks away. The past few weeks have been close to living hell in terms of preparation and getting her own confidence up after coming back form the academy in Vancouver and a month off in the summer. 

She threw on a hoodie and slung her bag over her shoulder, pausing to fill up her water bottle before heading out. Resistantly, her legs moved one in front of the other, softly receding down the hall away. There was a dull ache in them, a familiar feeling of her calves on painkillers. It was a particularly bad day. Towards the right there were clusters of kids piling into study hall, but instead of joining them she made a hard left, walking down a darker and more secluded section of the school. They carried her to a dark red double door, with rusting metal bars from years of use. A laminated piece of paper was messily plastered on.

_OGS Ice Rink Schedule Oct-Nov_

_8AM - 11AM Ontario Knights Practice  
_ _11:30AM - 12:30PM OGS hockey club  
_ _12:30PM - 2:30PM Free skate (OGS students only)  
_ _2:30PM - 5:00PM Public skating  
_ _5:00PM - 6:00PM Closed for maintenance  
_ _6:00PM - 8:00PM Ontario Knights Practice_

Huh, okay. More than the slanted paper on the wall what bothered her was the empty slot between eleven and eleven thirty. Which conveniently was the current moment. With a sigh she pushed the door open and the sound echoed through the large stadium, and a familiar, cold rush of air embraced her.

There was a clean, crisp scent in the air, accompanied by the light hum of florescent lights. The rows of seats had been folded up so that the rink stood firmly in the centre, surrounded by rubber mats and streaks of water from the previous hockey practice. She dropped her bags and took a deep breath, taking in the quiet freedom of the ice. She felt a tear well up behind her closed eyes and thought for a moment to let it fall, unsure if it came from happiness, melancholia, or nostalgia, before she heard a clean scrape of a blade against the ice.

“Tess.”

She opened her eyes to see, of course, it was Scott. In a black faded Maple Leafs t-shirt and black jeans, hair parted in a flustered mop. There was a slight smirk on his face that normally would go unnoticed, but Tessa recognized that glint in his eyes.

She managed to get out a weak _hey,_ but that was about it. Tessa knew he was looking for an explanation as to why someone was at the rink, why she looked ready to step onto the ice in a pair of Uggs, _why she had left him behind in Ilderton._ But she didn’t have an answer for herself yet, so she let the cold, dry air and the hum of the lights take over.

“So,” Scott started, speaking just loud enough so she could hear. “You wanna skate?”

His request caught her by surprise. The only thing separating them were the boards that marked the line from land to ice—but she somehow felt a million miles away, stepping foot on foreign soil and not the one she grew up on.

Again, she had no answer for him.

Scott ran a hand through his hair and looked around hazily before nodding to the small booth off to her left. 

“Your skates are in the second cabinet on the left. Password’s four zeros.” 

He pushed off and turned away from her, shifting his weight onto his left foot and getting a perfect outside edge. 

She should have responded to him before he skated off, taken the many opportunities he gave her instead of just wordlessly leaving. But words were foreign to her and she couldn’t find a way to talk to him without accidentally saying what she really felt.

She was scared that if she started skating with him again, she’d never be able to stop.

 

**August, 2002**

Tessa had never been happier. Coming back from winning the Junior Four Continents division in Shanghai was the best feeling in the world, stepping on the highest platform bearing a heavy gold medal with the Canadian national anthem playing in the background. Tears had welled up in her eyes and she had sniffled maybe just a bit too loudly, but she smiled widely as she felt Scott’s hand find hers, lacing their fingers together with a slight squeeze. 

On the plane ride back, she had hers and Scotts medals tucked neatly between two book in her carry on backpack (she didn’t trust him to pack his medal). Her mother sat next to her, intently watching a movie playing as Tessa read up on the English material she was missing from online school. Just as she was about to doze off, head leaned against the window, she heard Scotts voice.

“Kate? Can we switch for a sec? I want to go over some videos with Tessa,” he had on a sheepish grin, and Tessa knew as her mother got up to go sit with Alma that he was most definitely not planning on going over their skating videos.

As he settled in, he poked Tessa playfully on the arm.

“Hey!” She laughed. “Stop it.”  
  
“But I can’t sleep,” Scott whined. “And why in the world are you reading that book? I did not need to read that in seventh grade.”

“It’s a good book,” she slapped him in the shoulder with Jane Austen’s book. “And aren’t we supposed to be going through videos?”

“Tess-a,” he groaned dramatically, emphasizing the syllables in her name. “Come on, we just won junior worlds. Let’s play chopsticks.”

He stuck out two fingers at her, and rolling her eyes, she shut her book and put out two pointer fingers to play on. Scooting closer to him, she smelled his familiar scent, musky and homey. His hair had grown out to be messy and long over the past few months, and more than once she would run her hands through them in a routine or end with her hands tousled in them. It felt odd how badly she wanted to do the same right now, nuzzling close to his side and letting his warmth pool over her in the chilly airplane cabin. 

“Hey, are you excited to start senior school?” He asked, putting on a movie and handing her an earbud. 

“I don’t really know,” she shrugged and mindless picked at her nails, hesitating just a too long before speaking again. “It’s not that different from junior school.”

“Wait, you’re not nervous, are you?” Scott nudged her with his shoulder, and she was glad the cabin was dark enough to mask the blush creeping up on her cheek. It was crazy how much he had physically changed the past few years, now a good few centimetres taller than her and body built out more. He had strong arms that were actually able to lift her and spin her around now

“No, no.” But she was. And she could tell that he knew that by the way he looked at her, squinting and questioning her answer. The truth was, not having Scott at her current school the past two years was already too hard. When her friends at junior school weren’t around all she needed to do was shoot a look over to him and he’d grab his bags from the table filled with a group of loud boys and follow her to the bleachers, the grass field, or even the library. They would go over choreography and footwork, she would help him on some schoolwork, or he’d throw popcorn kernels at her as she read. Either way, she always had him to fall back on.

At the senior school in Ilderton, Tessa knew that he (of course) had a large group of friends, a life and schedule already set, and even a few girls that would eye him when he walked down the halls. It was his life five hours a day when it wasn’t on the ice with her or half way across the world.

“Aww, come on kiddo,” he wrapped an arm around her shoulders, flipping up the armrest between them and pulling her in to his side. The gesture was small, nothing irregular coming from them, especially considering all of their movements and lifts on ice. But Tessa still had a hard time ignoring the way her heart fluttered at his touch. 

She sighed loudly, rolling her eyes as she could feel how happy he was in this moment to know that she needed him. “I just want to skate forever, and not have to deal with school and life and stuff.” 

What she really meant was _could I just stay on the ice with you forever._

 

**October, 2006**

“Hey where were you?” Kaitlyn asked as Tessa sat down next to her. She hoped that Kaitlyn wouldn’t notice the slightly rosy hue of her cheeks.

“I just spent some extra time at the studio,” Tessa responded, averting her gaze.

Luckily she seemed to have left it at that. Kaitlyn didn’t need to know about the encounter that occurred a few minutes prior. After leaving Tessa standing by the boards he skated at the far end of the rink in circles,serpentines, and various other patterns. It was alarming how odd it looked for him to be skating on his own, a tiny speck on the large stretch of white ice. Even when it wasn’t with her, he was always surrounded by his friends or a brother or two.

_Second cabinet on the left. Passwords four zeros._

She’d bet anything that he was the one to set that password—always being too trusting and not bothering to ever change the numbers. The cold ice glared back at her, reflecting back a warm and unprecedented sense of comfort. Even as her calves ached she longed for the feeling of effortlessly moving across the ice, of shifting her weight through the edges of the blade.

“Andrew’s taking me to get my skates resharpened in a bit,” Kaitlyn squealed, snapping Tessa back to reality as. 

“Oh is that for the winter skate thing?”

“Yep, they do it every year for the graduating class,” she had on a sly grin. “And Andrew asked me, so I get to go too!”

Tessa laughed, glad that her best friend was happy. She really did like Andrew, and they were always holding hands around the halls or whispering to each other. 

As they shifted gears to return to their work, she instinctively looked up just as Scott walked through the door. He was still wearing the same black shirt now with a jacket over it and a large bag slung over his shoulder. She watched maybe a little too closely as a petite girl with a delicate frame and icy blonde hair pulled into a tight pony tail glided over to him, placing a hand on his shoulder.

She nudged Kaitlyn. “Hey, who’s that?”

“Jessica Dubé. Figure skater,” she said, discretely looking over and turning back. “Also Scott’s ex-ex. Or is it ex-ex-ex? I can’t keep track anymore, the two of them have gone back and forth since tenth grade.”

_No wonder they’ve gone back and forth,_ Tessa thought. Everything was wrong about her. The way she stepped a foot too close into his space and which his shoulders tense up, the hand on his shoulder that kept him facing her. The messy bun of blonde sitting atop her head that was _just_ too chaotic to be considered stylish.

Right then Andrew came to plant a quick kiss on Kaitlyn’s cheek, and they mindlessly chatted while she gathered up her things. She gave Tessa a quick hug and a wink before leaving with him, pretty much glowing as she walked off with him. It surprised Tessa even more as she saw Jessica stand up to greet the couple, playfully laughing at something Andrew said before pulling Scott up and ushering them to leave as well. Tessa couldn’t make out the expression on Scott’s face, but a shiver ran down her spine at the sight of the tall girl putting her hand into his as they walked out the door.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> THANK YOU EVERYONE for such lovely comments! I really appreciate every one of them and it really does keep us little hobby writers going on A03 haha. I'm travelling in Kyoto at the moment and banged out like three chapters on the plane and the next one is a WHIRLWIND!! stay tuned...


	5. the umbrellas of cherbourg

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is a doozy. thank u for reading <3

**October, 2006**

It was the third time this week Tessa found herself crying in the girls restroom outside of the ballet studio. Whether it was from the intense classes that have been kicking her ass or the pain in her legs, she wasn’t sure. She waited for her breath to even before reapplying some concealer in attempt to hide her slightly puffy eyes and exiting and making her way to study hall, gripping her grey cardigan against her sides. 

Her eyes were red from the confines of the bathroom stall so she kept her head down in attempt to avert peoples’ gaze as best as possible. Turning around the corner she heart an unusually loud laugh and she saw that it came from the tall blonde girl. They stood at the entrance of study hall as if purposefully blocking out all the late comers. He had on a white sweatshirt this time, with his name and number printed in navy on the back—all that it was lacking was the ‘C’ for captain. Tessa suddenly realized that she still had his other hoodie, folded neatly on an unused couch in her bedroom.

It had been over a week since their encounter at the rink, and they haven’t so much as exchanged a glance since then. But somehow she could always feel his presence—the way the atmosphere shifted towards him when he walked into a room, the slight tinge of uncertainty that tugged on her sides as he came closer.

With a hopefully small step of hesitation, Tessa made a sharp turn left instead of towards the two of them at study hall. She head down the dark hallway until she couldn’t hear the chatter of her classmates anymore, and on instinct pushed open the dark red doors.

As always, the cold air of the rink lifted the weight off of her shoulders as she sighed a breath of relief. The soft hum of the lights were steady, and she was sure to check completely around her and on the ice to make sure that it was empty. She took off her cardigan, letting her skin feel the pleasant shiver from the rink against her black leotard and leggings. Her legs took her to the booth off the side and she inputted the password into the keypad. 

_Second cabinet on the left. Password’s four zeros._

She was surprised to see that there indeed was a pair of white leather skates sitting on it’s own in the second cabinet on the left. A thin layer of dust covered the shelf and skates, but under it she could tell that the leather was still a pristine white. She doesn’t remember taking out the skates and heading back to the benches to put them on, but just the amplified sounds in the empty room. It seemed like second nature to her, her fingers knowing how to weave through the laces and tie them up before her mind even registered the actions. The foam was perfectly formed around her heel, though her toes were snugged tightly in the front of the skate. 

Stepping onto the ice for the first time in five years felt more familiar than it probably should have. It wasn’t that there wasn’t any opportunities to skate in Vancouver—she was still in Canada after all—but it had felt so wrong being on the ice without Scott next to her, holding her hand or with an arm reassuringly wrapped around the small of her back. So for the past five years it’s been an array of _I don’t skate, sorry_ or _I can’t risk an injury_. But it was so easy to fall back into the rhythm of pushing through the edges of her skate, feeling the wind whistle through her ears and flow through the locks of her brown hair.

It was totally silent except for the sound of her skates scraping against the ice, and it took her a second to figure out that what she was doing was running through the steps of an old programme. Was it Umbrellas of Cherbourg?

Soon enough the first few bars of the song rang through the stereo system of the rink, and Tessa stopped and blinked in bewilderment. Looking around it seemed totally empty—was she slowly slipping into insanity and this was just her mind playing nostalgic tricks on her?

“So you still remember it.” She turned sharply, seeing Scott gliding up to her, hands in his pocket. He had a smug grin on his face.

“I’m sorry-there wasn’t anyone here,” she began. “And the rink is supposed to be empty or not have any plans between eleven and eleven thirty so I thought I’d just—“

“Tess, stop,” he chuckled, sliding to a clean halt a few metres away from her. “You know you’re always welcome in this rink, don’t sweat it.” Umbrellas of Cherbourg echoed behind them. She smiled at him, tugging a bit at her fingers and paying a bit too much attention to the deep hue of his voice.

The song continued, and Tessa could tell by the way Scott shifted his weight between the skates that he was itching to start moving. Hesitantly, he moved forwards a bit and held a hand out to her as the pre-chorus began.

_If you start skating with him you’ll never stop, Tessa._

She looked down at it, pushing forwards to meet him.

_Don’t risk the injury, Tessa._

Gingerly she placed his hand in his. She always ran cold, and it was comforting to feel the warmth from his hands.

_You_ cannot _be skating with him, Tessa._

He grabbed her hand lightly, and she let herself be pulled into his space, taking her position next to him with ease. They wordlessly skated forwards for a few seconds to the beat of the song, in perfect harmony as they used their outside edges to turn the corner. It’s been five years since she’s felt her hand in his, the warm comfort feeling all too familiar to her.

Before she knew what was happening she was leading him into the waltz section as the chorus played, putting her hand on his shoulder as his found the small of her back. It was a hold that they had practiced countless times, and their feet found the perfect rhythm balancing off each other. She traced her palm over his chest, surprised at the strong muscles there and noticed that yes, his arms had in fact chiseled out as well. They continued to move in flawless synchronization, and she found that she was instinctively spotting him after twizzles or letting her eyes linger on his soft brown ones as they returned to the waltz hold. 

It surprised her even more as they moved into the final lift of the song, a very simple hold with her body stretched across Scott’s and then rotated up until he held her by the waist with her pressed against his front. The landing was clean, with a simple arabesque on ice gliding forwards that Tessa had found to be difficult five years ago but easier now that she spent her days working on these moves in ballet.

It was as if she had never stepped off the ice.

He reached for her hand and pulled her back into the centre of the rink as the song came to an end, wrapping his arm around the small of her back. She instinctively reached looped her arm around his neck, letting her hand slide comfortably into his hair. As the final beat of the song left the air, they stood holding each other just a while longer, trying to let the moment last.

They were both panting, either out of fatigue or the revelation of what had just happened, or perhaps both. Scott’s chest rose and fell under her palm in a steady rhythm, and she felt him tuck a piece of her hair behind her ear, letting his hand slide down to cup her cheek.

“Scott I—we can’t—“ Tessa started, but before she could finish he closed the space between them, pressing his lips softly against hers.

It was lighter and slow at first and Tessa could feel his hesitation. But she felt bolder and more confident somehow when this close to Scott, and so she traced her tongue along his bottom lip, easing his mouth open. His arm gripped her waist tightly, keeping it close to her as if preventing her from ever leaving, and his other hand found it's place on her cheek, gently tipping her head upwards. Tessa’s fingers absentmindedly twisted around his soft hair, holding them and tugging slightly before they finally broke a part, foreheads touching and wrapped in each other’s embrace in the middle of the rink. 

Scott ran his fingers gently and rhythmically up and down her bare arm, literally taking her breath away. Her heart was beating so hard that she thought he must be able to hear it, and there were some indescribable flutters in her stomach. She bit her lip a bit as she sighed softly. _How I could I be feeling so much for him when I barely even know him?_

Suddenly the loud click of the door opening and the bang of it shutting abruptly again snapped them back into reality, and they quickly skated back from each other. Tessa could feel a burning trace on her back that his arm had been holding so tightly, and her lips tingled with the lingering feeling of his lips.

A laugh accompanied with some joyful chatter came from a few ninth graders now walking into the rink from the other side. Tessa could feel a blush coming on to her cheeks.

“I’m sorry,” she started as the two younger boys came onto the ice wearing their hockey gear. She was about to skate a small circle away from him when he caught her hand and held onto it softly. It was slightly alarming just how well they still fit together. 

“The Winter Skate.” 

Tessa couldn’t read the expression on his face. His eyes were soft as always but had a certain intensity to them that she wasn’t really used to. A mop of brown hair fell unevenly over them and his cheeks were slightly rosy either from the heat of the moment or the cold of the ice.

“Come with me.”

Her heart skipped a beat as he asked. She hated how he could so simple say a few words and automatically trigger so many emotions in her.

“Aren’t you going with Jessica or something?” She asked quietly. Behind him the boys had stepped onto the ice with their sticks and were passing a puck in between them, barely acknowledging their existence.

“Tess,” he said her name with so much warmth that that alone was enough to send a shiver through her body. He tugged lightly on her hand as if to test her limits, and as she stared steadily into his eyes he let himself come a little bit closer to her, opening his mouth to speak.

“SCOTT! You ready or what, man?” A young boy skated up to him, his friend following close behind, causing Scott to quickly drop her hand.

“Yeah!” He immediately shifted back into his usual self, dropping the intensity in his eyes and instead shifting to his boisterous and outgoing self. “Go run some drills while I change my skates.”

They skated off continuing to pass the puck back and forth between them, as Scott turned back to her.

“I’m sorry, I said I’d coach these eight graders who want to make the team next year before public skate starts,” he said running a hand through his hair.

She gulped and glanced down at his skates, a shiny and relatively new looking toe pick at the front.

“No, uh, I have to go anyways,” she murmured, avoiding his gaze again and turning away. “Thank you for the skates.”

Her heart pounded in her chest as she left him on the ice, not being able to bear hearing his response. As fast as she could she unlaced her skates and tied a messy single knot to put them together, but still making sure to put them gently in their spot at the cabinet on the left. Before the rusty red doors of the stadium banged shut she noticed that Scott had saved her some of her dignity and waited for her to leave before coming back to the stands and changing to his hockey skates.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i loooove you sm for reading this pls drop a comment if you'd like it or if you didn't like it :))


	6. dance with me

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this was a fun chapter to write and longer than usual as well <3
> 
> pls enjoy

**October, 2006**

Strands of hair swept over her eyes, damp from her perspiration and messily untangled from what used to be an impeccable ballet bun. Her stomach churned as she reached for her water bottle, a mixture of fatigue from skipping breakfast and the side effects of taking the painkillers for her legs. 

“It needs to be _more,_ Tessa, stop hesitating,” Madame Clemente said, pausing the music. “Keep practicing, you’ll figure it out.”

Tessa forced down a frustrated groan. She realized that Madame Clemente was pushing her far more than the other girls, made evident by the way that she critiqued ever tiny detail and how she skipped over those details with the others. But most of all she nagged about the dullness in her performance and how she needed more expression and emotion and whatever.

She excused herself to the restroom as one of the other girls began practicing the solo. Splashing some water on her face she blinked down some hot tears that threaten to pour down her face and sat on the toilet seat, rubbing her calves trying to find some relief. On her way back to the studio they felt better, but still wrung out with the familiar exhaust that came in the few weeks prior to auditions.

“She could actually get it, Allie,” Tessa heard a hushed tone speaking in the studio as she was about to turn the corner. She must’ve spent more time than she realized in the bathroom, the music-less echo of the studio being all too apparent.

“Yeah, did you see her turns? They’re actually, like perfect. And she’s so good at getting the details right.”  


“No, no, no, guys,” Allie’s voice was thick and sharp. “You heard Clemente, she has no emotion. Carmen is known for being fierce and confident and sexy and she’s just not that.”

Tessa realized who the _she_ they were referring to was. Being unable to walk back into the studio to gather her things she took off in her pointe shoes, the dull sound of the canvas ringing against the floor of the hallways. A hefty ache surrounded her body, and she bit her bottom lip to keep from crying as she walked strictly and quickly down the hall. Upon instinct she took a left turn rather than right to the no doubt bustling study hall. The darker hush of the hallway to the ice rink was comforting, and it steadied her senses as the doors opened and shut irritably loudly.

Her heartbeat pounded strongly in her head as she sat herself down on the stands, untying the ribbons of her pointe shoes and casting them to the side, giving her red and numb toes a good stretch. She leaned back and closed her eyes, focusing on inhaling and exhaling the cold air. Eventually she heard a few soft thuds of the metal stands and saw him walking towards her with a sheepish grin, a pair of white ice skates in his hands. He hesitated as she looked up at him, stopping as if intruding on her private space. As if this wasn’t the skating rink that _he_ practically ran that she so jauntily strolled in on for the third time. 

“I took the liberty of grabbing your skates for you,” he said, lifting the perfectly white leather bound skates up by their tied laces. “Seems like you could use a skate.” He set them down about a metre away from her and walked off, stopping to take his skate guards off before getting back onto the ice and bending down to pick up a few orange cones. 

The gesture was overwhelmingly sweet, and she saw that he had even picked up a few pieces of foam and tucked them into the skates, no doubt noticing her sock-less, post-ballet state. But she was too angry and frustrated to thank him, the constant pounding in her head reflecting her emotions in diligent persistence. She slipped them on easily, lacing them up and walking towards the boards while rubbing her arms. It seems that whenever she’d see him she was always wearing very limited clothing, today being a pair of booty shorts over a navy leotard that was backless except for a few straps the criss-crossed over the small of her back.

Scott was mindlessly moving goal posts and setting up cones, whistling softly to himself and pretty much ignoring her. It was as if he still knew the ins and outs of her as well as he did five years ago—when she was angry like this consoling or talking would only further aggravate her, something that her mother, her sister, and Kaitlyn have still yet to realize. 

She tentatively skated the perimeter of the rink a few times first, and saw that Scott was indeed just minding his own business as if she were never there. Although she had calmed down from before the pounding in her head hasn’t subsided yet, and she pushed forwards faster as her blood boiled beneath her skin. The world slowly washed away as Allie’s words rang through her head in a constant rhythm. 

_Fierce, confident, sexy._

Just skating wasn’t enough anymore, and she pushed off into a simple spin, keeping her leg outstretched in front of her and then pulling it in slowly before grabbing on to the blade of the skate and pulling her leg up into a scorpion. It felt surprisingly easier than when she last attempted it years ago, but then again her balance and flexibility has improved in literal leaps and bounds since.

_Fierce, confident, sexy._

Next she pushed into a simple arabesque before dropping into a perfect penché with the wind pushing through her messy locks, balancing into her skate to round the corner. 

_Fierce, confident, sexy._

She knew the footwork to Carmen so well she translated it onto the ice, turning and crossing over her legs and playing with the pressure on the two thin blades. Tessa had never been a singles skater and it felt a bit lonely and alien to be performing intricate moves on ice without a partner—but then again most things today now felt like that. 

She closed her eyes, trusting the her skates to carry her around the ice with the occasional flustered spin or single salchow, waiting for the ice to cool the boiling blood beneath her skin. It was finally starting to quiet down before she did a backwards crossover straight into a person. Her feet slid out from underneath her but a pair of arms firmly caught her before she could land on the ice.

“Wow,” Scott chuckled as she regained her balance and turned to face him. _Had my heart been beating this fast the whole time?_

“I’m sorry,” she sighed, wincing from embarrassment. “I really needed that.”

“You looked pretty damn perfect. As always,” he added, causing a slight blush to colour her cheeks as she wrapped her arms over her body, suddenly conscious of the very skin tight leotard gripping her body.

She took in a breath, exhaling with a smile that she didn’t know had formed. It was like the weight on her shoulders had lifted and it was just them on the ice, completely oblivious to the rest of the world. Tessa could tell that he was picking up on these cues as his eye twitched slightly, irrevocably trained on her. 

He held out a hand to her. “You wanna talk about it?”

 

**September, 2002**

Alma Moir drove Tessa home from the rink today. It was supposed to be her dad, but after waiting twenty minutes and an abundant of unanswered calls from Alma they had decided that it would be the most productive course of action for her to take the ten minute detour and drop Tessa off at the Virtue residence before heading home with Scott. 

“I’m sure he just forgot and shut his phone off to work, sweetie,” she said from the wheel. “God knows he’s been busy,” she murmured. 

Tessa shifted uncomfortably and rubbed her legs. It was late and they were all tired from a day of coaching and practicing, and Tessa was beyond embarrassed for needing Alma to stay and driver her back for the second time this week. From beside her Scott tapped her shoulder and patted his lap, as if sensing the soreness in her calves. She gratefully moved to sit against the door of the car and propped her legs up onto his lap. He kneaded his fingers into her muscles, undoing the knots that had so painfully sought refuge.

When they finally arrived at her house her legs tingled with where his hands had been relieving the pain. The house was an unusually sinister quiet, and Tessa was about to call out when she heard their voices. 

“Well what am I supposed to do, Jim?” Her mother’s voice rang throughout the house. “They’re actually getting serious and getting _good_ at skating and Tessa needs to have that confidence. We _need_ to be supporting her and that means Alma and I working to do that!”

“What about Jordan then? And Casey and Kevin?” Her father raised his voice impatiently. “I can’t be the only one supporting this entire fucking household.”

“Is that what we are then? Your fucking household that’s leeching money away from you and—and that _bitch?_ ” There was a choke of sobs in her words that she wasn’t used to hearing. Then another pause. 

“We hear from the CBC in a few days. If she get’s in on scholarship and chooses to go I can take her to Vancouver as Jordan graduates and we won’t be of bother to you anymore,” her mother said softly.

Before they could hear her, Tessa slipped out of the front door and shut it gently, running back onto the streets hoping Scott and Alma hadn’t gone too far. Luckily they were stuck at the red light on her street, and she ran as fast as she could to their silver car and stepped off the curb to tap the passenger side’s window.

“Tess? What are you doing?” Scott rolled down the window, and she knew he saw the tears streaming down her face when his expression automatically switched to worry. He cracked the door open and Tessa climbed in just as the light was turning green.

He pulled her into his embrace and wrapped an arm around her shoulder, tracing delicate circles over her pink jacket. She cried softly and shallowly into his blue Maple Leafs sweatshirt, leaving a small patch of tears.

“Tessa are you okay? What happened?” Alma asked, sneaking peaks from the rearview mirror.

She had never been happier to have Scott by her side as she did then, shushing her mother while stroking her hair through his fingers. He really did know exactly what to do and when to do it, including letting her cry it out into his shoulder in the back of his mother’s minivan.

Tessa decided then that what she was crying about was not the possibility of her parents splitting up, leaving her father, or moving across the country. She decided that she was crying for the boy that was holding her steady, letting her fall helplessly into his embrace. The boy that knew what she was doing one step before she did, who loved cheesy romantic movies and held her hand every day without fail on the ice.

 

**October, 2006**

She tried to not make it a habit. Really, she did. That first time it had just been such an intense class and it felt so good to skate again, so the next day she sought refuge in the same worn out rink. By the fourth day she found that Scott had already left a pair of skates with extra foam padding on the bleachers, laced tied up pleasantly, waiting for her.

It seems that they have decided implicitly that on ice nothing had changed; they could go on, hand in hand, pushing off of each other and using the other to balance. He could hold her by the waist or bury his face into the crook of her neck and she could let her fingers tug at his hair and graze the muscle on his back. Though when the skates were off and the laces tied he was back to Scott Moir and his charismatic self, loosing the lust in his eyes he found so easily when lifting around Tessa. And she was to be Tessa Jane Virtue, the perfect 4.0 student, and expected-to-play the leading role of Carmen in the upcoming Canadian ballet. 

She really didn’t like that very much anymore. It was so much easier just being Tessa and Scott—two halves of one whole rather than one-third each.

“You’re falling out of the twizzles,” Scott said with a smirk.

“And _you’re_ forgetting the steps,” she said back, poking a finger at his chest.

They also never talked about Vancouver on the ice. They were skating around the rink, pushing occasionally and letting the inertia guide them forwards. She pretended that she didn’t spend the last few nights lying in bed with her heart racing at the thought of him and her at the Winter Skate.

“Hows ballet?”

She sighed, not sure where to start.

“That bad?” There was an obviously surprised tone in his voice.

“I’m getting the technique and everything but apparently I,” she tried to find the right words before going back to quoting Madame Clemente. “Lack emotion.”

“Lack emotion?!” Scott moved around so that he faced her and skated backwards from her. She gave him a slight nod. “That’s bullshit.”

“Not really. I actually kind of feel it.”

“But you’ve always been better than me at acting, you know, the expressive dance part.” His index finger traced circles on the back of her hand. “You still are.”

“Scott you’ve never seen me dance before.”

“I’ve seen you skate though, and it’s pretty insane. You’re a natural born performer, more than just technique and form.”

Tessa shrugged, staring down at her skates and trying to feather off the blush that was rising on her cheeks. She didn’t say what she wanted to say, which was that _the reason she had more emotion on the ice was because she felt so much more when next to him._

They reached the end of the rink and he surprised her by not letting her step off the ice as usual, but connecting his phone to the speaker. A few seconds later El Tango de Roxanne blasted throughout the stadium.

He held out her hand. “Dance with me?” He said with a wink.

She tried to stifle her laugh as much as possible as she took his hand and let her be pulled into his side. Tessa felt herself sink into the music as they twirled around a bit, improvising as they go along. It was so much easier skating with him. Like all their troubles had been washed away and she could just drown herself in the music and in his arms. She smirked a bit as the song reached the chorus and he had her in an easy lift. Of course he would choose _this_ song, a song in which the female lead is the sexy cabaret actress. 

_Twizzle, twizzle, step sequence, step sequence, prep for a lift, spin, land, turn._

The whole dance occurred in a blur, and before she knew it it had fizzled to an end and they were skating back to the edge of the rink, panting and with their hands held loosely.

“You see?” He said, turning to stop her before she stepped off the ice. “Clemente must be blind if she couldn’t see that in you.”

Luckily he stepped onto the rubber before he could catch the rosiness spread on her cheeks. Perhaps it wasn’t that Clemente couldn’t see the performer in her—it was just that skating felt more natural emotion wise. She stared at his back as he put his skate guards on and walked off. Or maybe it isn’t the _what_ in question and rather the _who,_ a little voice said in her head.

Her eyes clung to the chiselled profile of Scott’s jaw and the way his shirt hugged his torso _just_ a bit too tightly. Tessa’s breath caught in her chest.

_Oh shit._

 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> is everyone ok with some minor smut coming up HAHA

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much for reading! Please drop a comment and let m know what you think <3


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